


the shape of everything you need

by decinq



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: M/M, The Raven King Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-08
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-07-22 05:42:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7422133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/decinq/pseuds/decinq
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adam thought, probably, that he disliked Ronan when they first met because Ronan was free to be angry. Adam wasn’t free to do anything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the shape of everything you need

 

 

 

 

It’s not really a story, is the thing. It keeps going. It’s something that happens, a moment, a blip, a trick of the light. A wrinkle in time. And then it just becomes something that happened, woven into the fabric of Adam’s past like everything else.

Maybe it is just like everything else.

But then again, maybe that’s the thing about a good story—even when it’s over, it’s not really over.

 

.

 

Adam thought, probably, that he disliked Ronan when they first met because Ronan was free to be angry. Adam wasn’t free to do anything.

And Ronan wasn’t afraid to die. He drove too fast and he drank too much and would spit in the face of God if ever given the chance.

Whereas Adam, all his life, has been afraid of many things.

 

.

 

It was windy when they met. It was summer when Adam itched to reach out. It was summer when he let himself imagine. It was mid-day when he caught Ronan looking. It was midnight. It was noon when their fingers accidentally brushed, both reaching for the same piece of paper. It was sunrise when Adam wrapped his hand around himself, and realized that he didn’t know when it started. It was 8:16 when he got to school and looked for Ronan, and didn’t find him. It was 9:39 when Adam watched Ronan’s profile as he drove. It was 9:39 when Ronan looked back. It was 6:21 when the world stopped. It’s 6:22 when it started up again.

 

.

 

Time isn’t real. Not in the way dirt and the smell of rain and the dark circles under Ronan’s eyes are real.

But Adam’s life has been about time as much as it’s been about anything. Time and money. The relief of a deep breath, a heavy sigh.

A heavy heart.

 

.

 

Sitting on Ronan’s bed wasn’t the scariest thing Adam had ever done. But it was scary.

It wasn’t until then that Adam understood: they were all scared. Of everything. What if Gansey really did die? How would they keep on living without him? How could they?

Ronan was just as scared as Adam was. Adam kissed him, and Ronan stood up and went, and Adam was still scared. His palms got clammy and his knees got jittery. His lips buzzed. His chest ached.

It wasn’t until then that Adam understood: Ronan was free to be angry but didn’t want to be. His fear and his grief were mixed together and they looked just like anger. Maybe they started as anger. Maybe everything does. Adam knew that time isn’t a straight line, but he didn’t know how they got to this place, this moment—where the space between their knees was nothing at all, where Ronan’s mouth tasted like the beginnings of dinner and the bitterness of tea and something else Adam would never have the words to describe—from the start, when Adam couldn’t look at him and see a single thing worth liking.

Maybe that’s the joke time plays, though—it’s funny how things change.

 

.

 

Time is a flat circle. Time keeps going. With or without them, life was going to keep on going. Moving forward, circling back. Again, but better.

Life, in theory, isn’t very long. But time drags on. Time flies. The days, as always, slip away.

In theory—

In theory, Glendower was just Schrödinger’s cat. He was alive until they found him. He was dead all along. He was dust and bone and the thing inside him that kept him alive had been gone for a long time. In theory, he was no more special than the rest of them.

But in fact, the rest of them were really very special.

 

.

 

When Gansey—

When Gansey died—

If it hadn’t worked, Adam wouldn’t have known what to do. How could any one person fix something so huge? How could Ronan dream up so much of what was destroying them? How could any one person do anything magical or good when any one life was already so hard? How could Adam have ever been able to choose to save one life over another?

They were on the side of the road when time stopped. The world stopped. Gansey’s breath stopped. Ronan’s phone kept ringing, and ringing, and then the ringing stopped.

“We don’t have anything else,” Gansey had said, and Adam had understood that this wasn’t his choice. Afraid or not, they had run right out of time.

And so Gansey had died, and Ronan had cried. And Gansey was right—they didn’t have anything else.

 

.

 

Time was a flat circle, and Noah disappeared into it, and Adam never got to say goodbye.

 

.

 

It’s an ugly thing, being alive.

They were safe. Blue drove them back to Fox Way, and it took Adam a long, long time to wash the blood out from under his fingernails. They stayed until they couldn’t. Adam drove Ronan’s stupid car back to the Barns, and Ronan pressed his face against the window.

There were a million things Adam wanted to do. A million things they both ought to do. Instead, Adam parked, and they went inside. Ronan said, “I’m not going to sleep,” and Adam nodded.

Ronan poured himself a drink, leaned back against the counter. He looked at Adam, and then held out his glass. Adam crossed to him and had a sip before handing it back.

“Can I shower here?” Adam asked.

“Only if you stay,” Ronan said, and Adam wanted to smile.

 

.

 

It was late when Adam found himself standing in the threshold of Ronan’s bedroom. It was early. It was always. It was scary. Adam wasn’t angry anymore. They were all tired. Time was a circle but maybe, finally, they were going forward.

No more ghosts. No more kings.

Adam pushed himself towards where Ronan was sitting up in his bed. Ronan pulled back the comforter, and Adam slid in. Ronan’s hand touched the skin of Adam’s arm, rubbed raw from the too-long, too-hot shower, and Adam exhaled.

“I—“ Ronan said. Stopped.

“I know,” Adam said, and Ronan inhaled.

 

.

 

There’s something to be said for good and bad, but Adam was sure that life was a bit more complicated than that. It’s a solid story, the black and white, but he always thought that what made life interesting was the places where the lines blurred. The scary parts. The ugly things.  

Ronan pressed his nose to the back of Adam’s neck, and Adam tugged his arms around him. “I’m not going to sleep,” Ronan repeated.

“So tell me a story,” Adam said, voice heavy.

“What kind of story?” Ronan asked.

 

.

 

Depending on where you start, every good adventure was at least a little bit about love.

 

.

 

It’s not really a story.

It’s not really a story about a car, and it’s not really a story about magic. Cars were everywhere. Magic was everywhere. It’s not really a story about a king. It’s not really a story about a forest.

But if it were a story, it might be a story about love.

A story that was never over.

 

.

 

“How ‘bout a good one?” Adam asked, and Ronan bit at the skin where Adam’s neck and shoulder met, and that was the start of something else entirely.

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first trc story, and i hope it's okay. i'm a big baby and always nervous about trying something new. i appreciate every ounce of kindness and every second spent on reading this. & thanks, as always, to quinn, for making this better. //[tumblr](http://springsoldier.tumblr.com).
> 
> title is from 'you are jeff' by richard siken.
>
>> you're in a car with a beautiful boy, and you're trying not to tell him that you love him, and you're trying to  
> choke down the feeling, and you're trembling, but he reaches over and he touches you, like a prayer for which no words exist, and you feel your heart taking root in your body, like you've discovered something you don't even have a name for.


End file.
